The World House – One piece of insane genius

For this entry I shall divert from the usual topics of this blog and point your attention to a book I just read. Guy Adams‘ The World House, one of the most bizarre, exciting and engaging books I’ve ever lain my hands on.

It took me a while to really get into the story of The World House. With the introduction of a number of characters and their story about how they ended up in the World House, it takes a while for the story to gain momentum.
As soon as the story gains momentum, there is no slowing down. Guy Adams takes his readers on a trip they will never forget.

The story is told from the perspective of several characters who end up in the World House and who by luck and chance form three seperate teams or groups in order to survive. Each group knows nothing of the others and only at the end do members of two groups meet. For the most part we follow the protagonists as they struggle to survive in this bizarre house that exists somewhere and somewhen outside our space-time continuum; the usual laws of physics do not seem to apply. Some rooms are just rooms, others contain jungles, oceans or mountains. There is also a library which holds the biography of every person on earth and maybe more.

The unfortunate tennants of the World House have to face challenges beyond their immaginations, from spectral terrors haunting the dark gulfs between the rooms to denizens of a sentient ocean. With the exception of a noted explorer from the 1930s everyone we meet is an everyday person. They do not have any special skills, they just try to cope in a world which is literally insane. It is really easy to identify and emphasize with Miles, Alan, Sophie, Penelope and the others, they are just like you and me. Mr. Adams describes the World House with an amount of detail that is bordering on the insane, insane because there are so many details which are simply insane. At the heart of the house sits a mad imprisoned godling, and Mr. Adams makes sure you, the reader, feel its presence just as much as the protagonists do.

Another pearl within this brilliant narrative is Sophie. Whenever the story is told from her perspective, it made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. She has a special way to see and think about the world, you’ll see…

And you will be surprised about the end and will be just as eager to get your hands on the sequel as I am now. So, if you enjoy strange and bizarre tales and especially if you love Neil Gaiman’s work and wonder what his tales would be like on a bad trip, get yourself a copy of The World House it is one insane and exciting ride of a read.